{"id":73560,"date":"2016-08-13T13:14:34","date_gmt":"2016-08-13T19:14:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/medicare-awards-southwest-memorial-three-star-rating\/"},"modified":"2016-08-13T19:14:34","modified_gmt":"2016-08-13T19:14:34","slug":"medicare-awards-southwest-memorial-three-star-rating","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/medicare-awards-southwest-memorial-three-star-rating\/","title":{"rendered":"Medicare awards Southwest Memorial three-star rating"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Kelly
Kelly Brimhall studies blood samples through a microscope at Southwest Memorial Hospital in 2013.<\/span>Sam Green\/The Journal<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The Centers for Medicare and Medicade Services recently awarded Southwest Memorial Hospital a three-star rating.<\/p>\n

The ratings are part of CMS\u2019s Hospital Compare rating, which assessed more than 4,000 hospitals across the country from one to five stars based on metrics such as timeliness of care, patient experience and mortality.<\/p>\n

Southwest Memorial was above the national average in timeliness of care, and was same as the national average in effectiveness of care, patient experience, readmission, mortality and efficient use of medical imaging, according to CMS. There was not enough data reported to assess the hospital in safety of care, another metric used to determine the ratings.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Southwest Health System CEO Kent Rogers said hospital staff members are examining the rating.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are many quality indicators published, and we take all measures of quality very seriously,\u201d he said. \u201cWe use all of these indicators to continuously make improvements in patient care.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a critical access hospital, in many cases Southwest Memorial makes sure patients are stable and then transfers them to another hospital, said SHS Marketing Director Haley Leonard. Most heart attack and stroke patients are transferred out, she said. There was no data in certain areas of the analysis because Southwest Memorial doesn\u2019t handle certain patients as a critical access hospital, Leonard said.<\/p>\n

Hospital personnel are looking at the data to see what they can improve, Leonard said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe thing we\u2019re paying most attention to is patient satisfaction,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s an exercise in quality improvement.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are 28 critical access hospitals in Colorado, and only six were rated in the assessment. Out of those, only Aspen Valley Hospital scored higher than Southwest Memorial.<\/p>\n

If people have the option to choose a hospital, they should look at multiple sets of data and determine what is right for them and their families, Leonard said.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone is different,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Hospital personnel want to be transparent and hope to continue hearing feedback from patients, Leonard said. She encouraged people to reach out to the hospital and voice any comments or concerns.<\/p>\n

The hospital staff will work internally to improve, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur job is to do our best for our patients,\u201d Leonard said. \u201cAll we can do is get better.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Area hospital ratings<\/h4>\n

Chinle Comprehensive Health Care Facility, Chinle, Arizona, 2 stars
\n Cibola General Hospital, Grants, New Mexico: 3 stars
\n Community Hospital, Grand Junction, 3 stars
\n Delta County Memorial Hospital, Delta: 3 stars
\n Gallup Indian Medical Center, Gallup, New Mexico: 2 stars
\n Lovelace Medical Center, Albuquerque, New Mexico: 3 stars
\n Mercy Regional Medical Center, Durango: 5 stars
\n Montrose Memorial Hospital, Montrose: 4 stars
\n Northern Navajo Medical Center, Shiprock, New Mexico: 2 stars
\n San Juan Regional Medical Center, Farmington, New Mexico: 2 stars
\n San Luis Valley Health, Alamosa: 3 stars
\n Southwest Memorial Hospital, Cortez: 3 stars
\n St. Marys Medical Center, Grand Junction: 3 stars
\n University of Colorado Hospital Authority, Aurora: 2 stars
\n University of New Mexico Hospital, Albuquerque, New Mexico: 1 star
\n Source: Centers for Medicare and Medicaid<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Analysis finds hospital in line with most national averages<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":73561,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[21,13,60,668,210],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-73560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-cortez","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-montezuma-county","tag-public-health","tag-southwest-health-system"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73560"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73560\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73561"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73560"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=73560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}